Green-washing

What does Wikipedia say?

Greenwash (a portmanteau of green and whitewash) is a pejorative term that environmentalists and other critics use to describe the activity of giving a positive public image to putatively environmentally unsound practices.

What does the NY Times say?

"As a design shorthand, it makes subtle use of specific colors, images, typefaces and the promise of what marketers call “an authentic narrative” to sell food...

Buy a greenwashed product and you’re buying a specific set of healthy environmental and socially correct values.

If the package does its work, then the food inside doesn’t actually have to be organic, only organic-ish...


And although “organic” is losing its power as a code word for certain cultural values, it doesn’t hurt to flaunt it if you’ve got it. The word appears 21 times on a box of Cascadian Farm Vanilla Almond Crunch..."

What's happening in Canada, and probably everywhere else?

"Shoppers shelling out a little more for fair trade coffees, teas and chocolates are too often being fooled by fake certification labels, say some groups pushing for federal intervention...


Fair trade products such as coffee or chocolate offer farmers in developing countries higher prices for their goods than they would typically receive on the world commodity markets. Money is directed to social and environmental development and fair labour wages.

Support for fair trade products has grown steadily. Canadians bought 21,500 kg of fair trade coffee in 1998, for example, and bought 940,000 kg in 2004."

I don't support fair-trade coffee, because technically I don't support any coffee. I don't drink it. Guess I should be looking into fair trade tea, beyond the greened package.